We've been through this situation before: An important dance center in Portland reaches the horizon line beyond which lies the black hole of oblivion. Back in May, it was Oregon Ballet Theatre, which managed to cover its $750,000 shortfall with a magnificent gala featuring dancers from all over the country that helped create the enthusiasm needed to raise more than $900,000.

Conduit, the downtown modern dance studio, operates on a far smaller scale than a ballet company, but it has reached the same situation. According to Tere Mathern and Mary Oslund, the center's co-artistic directors, it needs to raise $15,000 by Aug. 31 to keep its doors open.

That doesn't sound like much.

But Conduit's yearly budget is only around $45,000. It has no paid staff, which means it doesn't even have an executive director making the rounds to round up donations and grants, let alone a development director. Renters of the studio pay more than 80 percent of that budget, and they include some of the most important modern dance choreographers in the city right now - Oslund, Mathern, Gregg Bielemeier and Minh Tran, among others. For the past couple of years, income hasn't matched increasing expenses, and a deficit has developed.

Oslund and Mathern are busy re-thinking the business model of Conduit, but in the meantime, they need some money to keep going.

Like OBT, they're starting with a gala, "We Are Conduit DANCE," this weekend and next.